Diane hands her key-card over to Miranda.

Miranda snatches it from her without a word. Yuuta can vaguely see her features, illuminated by the red glow of the alarm above. Her brows are furrowed, and she is intent on looking down, her fists scrunched by her sides.

“I care about you, Miranda,” Diane says as she reaches out to touch her shoulder. “I’m doing this because I love you, and I want to protect what we—”

Miranda slaps her hand away. “Don’t you touch me,” she snaps, her boots clinking against silvers as she swipes the card across the slit embedded in the wall. Tears are falling down her face, ones she doesn’t even bother hiding nor wiping away. “First dad, and now you? I don’t believe this.”

Yuuta gulps. But no matter how much he swallows, it isn’t enough to keep his guilt away. “I’m sure you’ll do good,” Xander tells him with a bittersweet smile. “You’ve… been a great rival. Thank you, for everything.”

Yuuta wants nothing more than to switch places with him, to save Xander from the hands of whatever it is that’s waiting to devour them in this lonely station, to hold him in his arms and never let go. But he cannot do either of those things. Because it is too late now, too late to go back and tell him, too late to go back in time and refuse this hell of a mission. So instead, he just laughs. It’s half-hearted, and they both know this, yet none of them choose to comment on it. “Don’t talk like you’re already dead,” Yuuta says as he holds out his fist. “I’ll see you soon, Major Williams, and then I’ll be the one kicking your ass into hell.”

Xander chuckles, yet his smile does not follow. He bumps Yuuta’s knuckles with his, and says, “Sure. Whatever you say.”

Their time is up. Yuuta and Miranda step foot back into the outside world—their world. The four of them hold their respective watches up to the scanners that confirm their IDs, permissions as members of the S.C.U to bypass the system and disconnect the stations.

Smoke emanates from below. The doors between them begin to close as the locks that had kept all gears in place rattle and shake the ground beneath their feet.

Yuuta’s heartbeat thrums within his ears. He takes one look at Miranda, another at Diane and Xander, before muttering the word, “Sorry,” and jumping back into the desolated station. It all happens too fast for anyone to stop him, and once the doors are finally shut, once the stations are now floating away from one another—Yuuta glances at Diane’s face again, distraught and torn with rage, as she shouts words inaudible to Yuuta and bangs her fist against the glass, next to a stunned version of Miranda whose eyes have gone wide.

I did it, he thinks, ignoring his shallow breaths, and Xander who trembles beside him; in anger or fear, he does not know. I’m in, Yuuta thinks.